Senegal Working To Improve Contraceptive Supply

Aug 09, 2012

In a post in the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s “Impatient Optimists” blog, Perri Sutton, an associate program officer on the family planning team at the foundation, discusses Senegal’s history of contraceptive stock-outs and Minister of Health Awa Marie Coll-Seck’s plan to “fix the problems that result in stock-outs and ensure that women have access to the full range of contraceptive options.” In pilot tests of an “informed push” model of contraceptive distribution, “[n]ot only have stock-outs been eliminated across the clinics involved, but the average weekly dispensing of a variety of contraceptives has increased dramatically,” Sutton says, adding, “As this system is rolled out across the country, Senegal will have confidence in national estimates of future demand for each product.” She concludes, “Every woman deserves the ability to decide whether, when and how many children she has. Senegal’s minister of health is taking bold action to provide the women of her nation with this life-saving opportunity” (8/8).